Riders who were on fire last year were not to be found; riders who've raced in the margins of the top 10 for years suddenly broke through. Here's a look at who emerged victorious from the run of Monuments and semi-Classics over the past 45 days, and who exited with tail between legs.

Winners

The Eastern Bloc: OK, Katusha's Joaquim Rodríguez was on some favorites lists for the Ardennes Classics, and he responded admirably with a win at Flèche-Wallonne. But if you had Enrico Gasparotto and Maxim Iglinskiy down to win Amstel and Liège, I'd recommend you use the hot hand next time Mega Millions goes so mega.

Gasparotto had some promising results early in his career—an Italian national championship and a stint in the maglia rosa at the Giro d'Italia among them—but until Amstel he had one win in the last three seasons, a stage of Tirreno-Adriatico.

Iglinskiy was a little easier to see coming; he's been top-10 at Flanders and Gent-Wevelgem, and is a past winner of Strade Bianche. But even though he was second there this year to Fabian Cancellara, he'd had a quiet Classics campaign with relatively anonymous top-15 placings at Amstel and Flèche.

The wins come at a crucial time for Astana, as the team is seeing the twilight of big names like Alexandre Vinokourov, and doesn't yet know whether Roman Kreuziger can improve on his career-best 5th at last year's Giro d'Italia. With two major WorldTour wins, they're looking in good shape for the all-important UCI points needed to gain a ProTeam license.

Peter Sagan: No, Sagan didn't win any major races (he did get a stage of Tirreno-Adriatico and one of the Driedaagse de Panne). But in the major races he did enter, here are his finishes: Milan-San Remo: 4th; Gent-Wevelgem: 2nd; Tour of Flanders: 5th; Amstel Gold: 3rd.

It's easy to forget that Sagan is just 22. It's already his third season on Liquigas-Cannondale. He's the star of the future for the Classics—this year was just the second time he's ridden most of those races and he's already on, or near, the podium. Want more proof? Look at his value chart from the excellent website CQ Ranking:

Pierre Rolland tried a solid move at Liège and despite that effort finished 12th. Voeckler took Brabantse Pijl with an aggressive display in bad conditions and might've been even better at Liège but for a crash on wet roads that forced him to chase back on late in the race. Turgot was 8th at Scheldeprijs.

The team isn't the deepest but for a second-division squad, it's punching far above its weight and at least for now its stars seem happy to stay put.

Patrick Lefevere: Just two seasons ago, Lefevere was captain of a sinking ship. His star rider, Tom Boonen, had seemingly gone to seed.

He sought foreign ownership to shore up sinking finances; held a reach of a training camp to identify prospective talent (which would be akin to an NFL team holding an open tryout because they had no draft analysis); and ended 2011 a lowly 16th out of 18 teams in sporting rank, below such titans as Ag2r and Euskaltel.

Fast forward to April and Lefevere is on top of the world—the top-ranked team, the dominant rider of the spring season, and a stacked roster with sprinters, climbers, Classics racers, Grand Tours specialists, time trialists, you name it. The savviest pickup might not have been a racer at all but ex-Highroad director Brian Holm, an underrated tactician; former Highroad manager Rolf Aldag is also a technical liaison.

Of all the so-called superteams, Omega Pharma emerged the strongest from the off-season, with smart acquisitions. Luck has certainly played a role, and now may begin to work against them as stage racers Tony Martin and Levi Leipheimer are both nursing injuries. Leipheimer has a fractured fibula and is said to be recovering more slowly than he'd hoped; he's questionable for his favored Tour of California.

Niki Terpstra: If not for Boonen, Terpstra would have been OPQS's best performer this spring. He won Dwars door Vlaanderen, was sixth at Flanders riding in support of Boonen, and was perhaps an untimely flat away from going to the wire with Tommeke at Roubaix. The Dutch rider could find his services in high demand next season, perhaps for a team like Rabobank (see below).

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Losers

The Superteams: Outside of OPQ and the Russian-Kazakh axis, the so-called superteams had a disappointing spring. Best among them was likely BMC Racing Team, with a resurgent Alessandro Ballan third at both Roubaix and Flanders, and Philippe Gilbert third at Flèche. But they expected more.

Gilbert seemed lost for most of the spring and former world champion Thor Hushovd was frustrated as well. Andy Rihs has made BMC the world's most star-packed cycling team and likely expected more for his money than this.

Now there's a clash between Andy Schleck and Johan Bruyneel over the latter's decision to keep director Kim Anderson home for the Tour de France. The younger Schleck has battled poor form this spring, and Bruyneel's patience may be wearing thin. That's to say nothing of RadioShack's famously short-fused money man, Flavio Becca.

Rabobank and Sky also had disappointing campaigns. Matti Breschel failed to materialize as a contender, and the team went to Amstel with an unusual situation of six "protected" riders and two workers (how's that math work, again?). Sky had the numbers at Roubaix but still couldn't control Boonen.

Greg Van Avermaet: GVA had maybe the best sustained form of anyone on BMC. But all spring he was an afterthought—riding in support of leaders like Hushovd, Ballan, and Gilbert—and even a second-run profile in the team's official roster announcements and quote files.

Despite a mountain of work, he won the bunch sprint at Flanders for fourth. Van Avermaet came to BMC last year in part to seek his own fortune; instead, he's often been relegated to a support role. Likely, the team knows something I don't—that GVA will never be a Classics winner for some reason that's not apparent to outsiders. But it seems to me like all the ingredients are there; what the man needs is a chance.

Samuel Sanchez: Euskaltel's perilously shallow roster depends on rainmakers like Sanchez to earn points. He had great form, coming off a win at Pais Vasco. But mechanical problems—a skipping chain—waylaid him at Amstel.

At Liège, he punctured on the Stockeu and simply never seemed to have the legs to make a serious move late. It didn't help that he and the team lost Igor Anton to a broken collarbone while the race was still in neutral roll-out.

Anton is one of the team's few other real leaders, and his crash will hamper efforts to gain points, while simultaneously reinforcing the team's rep for nervous handling that often results in crashes.

About Boulder Report

Boulder, Colorado-based contributor Joe Lindsey offers investigative journalism, analysis and humor about cycling. A popular slogan in this cycling and university town is "Keep Boulder Weird." Lindsey's certainly doing his part.